MRT: Ridership remains high despite limited connectivity

PETALING JAYA: The daily ridership for MRT Phase One remains high despite its limited connectivity, said Rapid Rail Sdn Bhd chief executive officer Datuk Zohari Sulaiman.
"During the one-month free ride promotions which ended on Jan 16, we saw a high ridership of 728,000 passengers on the MRT SBK line, an average of about 24,000 daily.
"We thought that after the promotion ends, the ridership would not be as high anymore given the limited connectivity of the line but we were wrong, as there was still an average ridership of approximately 15,000 daily," he told theSun recently.
He added that the figure is expected to spike tremendously once Phase Two of the line is fully operational by July 17 as announced recently by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Abdul Razak.
He explained that the increase is mainly because Phase Two connects most of the densely populated areas in Cheras and Kajang as well as integrating or connecting with some of the existing urban rail networks in the city centre such as the Kelana Jaya LRT line, the Ampang and Sri Petaling LRT line as well as the KL Monorail Line.
"The integrating or connecting stations include Sungai Buloh station (connecting with KTM Sungai Buloh), Muzium Negara station (connecting the KTM Komuter, LRT Kelana Jaya line, KL Monorail Line as well as the ERL KLIA Express and Transit Line), Bukit Bintang station (integrating with KL Monorail Line), and Tun Razak Exchange station which will integrate with the MRT Sungai Buloh-Serdang-Putrajaya (SSP) line," he said.
Asked on the popular stations in Phase One, Zohari said one of it is the Mutiara Damansara station because of its close proximity to shopping malls, hotels, and business centres.
"The other popular station would be the Kota Damansara station that is located near Segi College which has made it very convenient for the students to travel to the college on their own," he said.
On a lighter note, Zohari revealed that most of the commuters have provided positive feedback towards the services they had received from the MRT station officers and the feeder bus captains.
Positive feedback was also received about the trains being spacious and comfortable for passengers, he added.